Welcome to my blog!

I'm an acupuncturist, teacher, fertility specialist, patient centered advocate, mom, activist and more! This blog is a place for me to write down the things on my mind, the things I discuss over and over, and the things I find helpful, interesting, and inspiring all in the hope that someone else out there, maybe YOU, will find some of these things to be helpful, interesting and inspiring too. I love learning, I love sharing, and I am passionate about helping others lead more balanced, fertile, and healthy lives - while trying to do the same myself. So here goes... The Blogging Life...

3.11.2013

Layaway vs. Credit Cards or Holistic Medicine vs. Western Treatments

Here's a repost of an oldie, but a fundamental goodie!

The other day I got to thinking about when I was younger and my mom put things on "layaway" at the local department store. We would go to the store and she'd go to the back desk and pay installments towards whatever item she wanted to purchase, and when it was paid in full she would get to take the item home. I was wondering if these layaways are around nowadays and thinking about how different it is to use credit like most people do today.

And then it struck me how perfectly this distinction can apply to fertility treatments. If you recall or review my post on "Bank Accounts" you'll see how I view the body as a bank account. In this analogy, the health of reproductive function is equivalent to the body's expendable income or vacation fund. A person's body must first have enough to cover a) all the functions it has to do to stay alive (breathe, digest, think, move, etc.) and b) is immediately asked to perform (work, socialize, exercise, etc.). After those two things, whatever is left over it puts towards reproductive function. Should a body be low on funds (for any number of reasons), it makes the wise (albeit often frustrating) decision to cut on this "non-essential" area. Menstrual cycles can become less regular, hormones can be out of balance, sperm counts off, and so on.

And so, when a person's account is low and reproductive function isn't happening as ideally as it should, there are two ways to look at improving the situation: Layaway or Credit!

Layaway is the holistic way. It says, you can't realistically expect to have a healthy reproductive function if you don't have the money (i.e. energy and nutrients in your body) to pay for it. Holistic medicine says that if you truly want to have a healthy pregnancy, you need to take the time, save up, spend less on other things, and then, you'll be able to take what you want home... in this case, a healthy pregnancy & child!

Credit is the western way. It says, you can have a baby now regardless of the state of your body (aka your bank account). It says that it can give you credit (in the form of drugs, procedures and sometimes 3rd party help) that you may or may not be able to pay back later. You pay in the form of financial strains, relationship strains, immediate and possible side effects from the medications, stress, etc.

Now, just like in real life, I'm not going to say credit is never the way to go, but what I do believe is that taking some time, saving up, spending less, and getting your account in line is HUGELY important and if you do all that and STILL aren't getting pregnant, then is the right time to weigh whether or not taking out a line of credit is the right next step. Very often, it does not come to that, and when it does you will need to take out much less and have fewer risks because of that fact. It's simply being smart with your body in the same way you'd be smart with your money!